Flow Compensation in Non-Balanced SSFP

Flow compensation is a critical issue in non-balanced SSFP imaging because high first-order moments are achieved in the dephasing direction. Phase accumulation leads to steady-state disruption and consequent blurring artifacts and signal loss, especially in presence of long-T2 tissues. In this work, a theoretical explanation of the artifacts is given, showing how phase fluctuations influence the amplitude and the stability of the signal, and optimized flow compensated SSFP-FID and SSFP-echo sequences are presented. Finally, In vivo application of the sequence is demonstrated